12

FORSAKEN BY THE WHOLE WORLD

It has been said of Maria Theresa that “no princess ever ascended a throne under circumstances of greater peril, or in a situation which demanded more energy, fortitude and judgment.”¹ Yet there was little evidence that the new monarch possessed the qualities to succeed as a sovereign. Even though Charles VI had desperately tried to protect his daughter’s inheritance through the Pragmatic Sanction, he had neglected to groom her sufficiently to take over the reins of state. Furthermore, there was nothing in Maria Theresa’s young life to show that she had the fortitude, courage, and stamina to take on the challenges ahead. Given the enormity of the troubles, simply holding on to her throne, much less succeeding as a sovereign, would be difficult. And no one was more aware of this than the new queen, who wrote: “I do not think anyone would deny that history hardly knows of a crowned head who started his rule under circumstances more grievous than those attending my accession.”²

Certainly many of her fellow countrymen wondered if the new Habsburg monarch was up to task. Would the queen leave the governing of the realm to others? Or would she rule effectively? The answer was not long in forthcoming. At Maria Theresa’s ascension, she overheard a minister mutter: “Oh, if she were only a man endowed with all that she possesses!” To which she retorted: “Though I am only a queen, yet have I the heart of a king.”³ Her words were almost a paraphrasing of Queen Elizabeth I of England’s famous 1588 address to the English army before the invasion of the Spanish Armada: “I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too.” Queen Elizabeth reigned for nearly forty-five years and is remembered as a decisive and politically astute monarch. Time would tell whether Maria Theresa would emulate Elizabeth I’s example.

From the day she held her first audience with her ministers, Maria Theresa was under no illusions. Her ascension as female ruler of the Habsburg dominions was unprecedented and could well bring unwelcome troubles. There were other disadvantages. The ministers she had inherited from her father were elderly, as well as paralyzed with fear over the empire’s future. As a whole and without exaggeration, the queen’s ministers “presented a picture of creeping senility, … [resembling] an array of grizzled patriarchs.”⁴ The chancellor, Count Philip Sinzendorf, was sixty-nine, while Count Gundacker Starhemberg, president of the chamber, was seventy-seven. Maria Theresa never relied on the unscrupulous, perennially in debt, and self-indulgent Sinzendorf. But the queen trusted the unselfish Starhemberg, though he did not have Sinzendorf’s grasp of international politics. In short, the majority of ministers at Maria Theresa’s disposal were not outstanding.

The one exception was the haughty but able Baron Bartenstein, who had compelled her beloved husband to give away Lorraine as part of their marriage bargain. Although Maria Theresa could not forgive Bartenstein for his actions, and would have liked nothing better than to be rid of the overbearing baron, she nevertheless let her head rule her emotions. Maria Theresa knew better than to dismiss Bartenstein at this critical juncture. His ministerial experience was crucial to her, so she retained him and listened to his advice. Well aware that the Habsburg dominions rested on foundations that could collapse at a moment’s notice, Maria Theresa set about demonstrating that the transition of power in Vienna had gone smoothly. She did not want more uncertainty, though the ministers “all were deeply imbedded in the past. Between them, the members of this cabinet or conference had helped [Maria Theresa’s father] Charles to ruin Austria.”⁵

Added to this dearth of talent among her ministers, the Habsburg monarchy itself suffered from ineffectiveness. It was in great need of reform and modernization. Troubles abounded in all directions, military, economic, and political. Maria Theresa was dismayed to find that her army was impotent. Its meager eighty thousand soldiers were expected to “defend frontiers reaching from those of the Netherlands and Parma, to those of [present-day] Turkey; the bulk of them, including almost all the cavalry, were in Hungary. There were only 40 pieces of artillery.”⁶ Desertions were not uncommon. Many soldiers had not been paid because of a near-bankrupt treasury. Only a paltry 100,000 florins were available to Maria Theresa to spend on ruling her lands. Moreover, credit was impossible to obtain; loans from her nobles had already been exhausted. Especially aggravating and potentially dangerous to the monarchy’s stability were widespread food shortages from poor harvests that could lead to riots. Nothing, it seemed, went the queen’s way.

To her ministers, Maria Theresa put on a brave face, but in private the queen shed tears of sadness and anxiety over these crippling problems. Recalling years later her predicament when she came to the throne, Maria Theresa wrote: “In these circumstances I found myself without money, without credit, without an army, without experience and knowledge, even without counsel, because all my ministers were wholly occupied in trying to discover which way the cat was going to jump.”⁷ In her new position, however, Maria Theresa willingly admitted her inexperience in governing. She later said of this critical moment: “I resolved not to conceal my ignorance, but to listen to each in his own department and thus to inform myself properly.”⁸ Seeking help did not come naturally to Maria Theresa. She recalled her “great timidity and diffidence” at the time.⁹ But with her abiding faith in God, the queen found the strength to forge on, noting, “From the outset I decided and made it my principle, for my own inner guidance, to apply myself, with a pure mind and instant prayer to God, to put aside all secondary considerations, arrogance, ambition, or other passions, having on many occasions examined myself in respect of these things, and to undertake the business of government incumbent on me quietly and resolutely,” for in the end “my duty was not to myself personally but only to the public.”¹⁰

From the day of her accession, though with child, Maria Theresa diligently worked at running her realm. Possessed of great self-discipline and will, the new queen set about making it known that she intended to be an active monarch. Blessed with a healthy constitution, Maria Theresa was determined not to let her pregnancy impede her. Whether pregnant or nursing or recuperating from childbirth, she studied her state papers carefully and met regularly with her government ministers. In this, Maria Theresa acted in the same vein as Queen Isabella of Castile, whose approach to ruling, even while pregnant, was unflaggingly energetic.

Also like Isabella, Maria Theresa had a strong sense of justice. Both queens, after all, had to contend with the issue of crime and revolt; dispensing justice was part of their role as monarchs. Neither tolerated insubordination and so sought to tamp down quickly actions that disturbed the public peace or were a menace to society and the crown. During one such revolt, over food shortages in Vienna in the first year of Maria Theresa’s reign, she ordered the condemned leaders to sweep the capital as a penalty, but with a punishing and humiliating twist. Attached to their legs were heavy chains that the men had to drag as they carried out their sentence.

Like Isabella before her, Maria Theresa was determined to be an effective ruler from her earliest days. In order to rule in a world dominated by men, both queens had to dig deep into their reserves of courage, fortitude, and will in order to succeed. Keeping their realms intact was the first step to unifying and strengthening their domains. Unity and strength would allow their subjects to prosper and live in peace. Strength through unity and peace through strength—these were the concepts that Isabella had lived by, and they were the concepts that Maria Theresa too embraced. These goals seemed nearly impossible to fulfill, but Maria Theresa would not let the thought of failure prevent her from doing her sacred duty to her peoples.

Among Maria Theresa’s many challenges was the Pragmatic Sanction. The queen believed the sanction, for which her father had worked so hard and sacrificed so much, to be nothing short of a sacred imperial inheritance. “‘God acknowledges my rights,’ she said, ‘He will protect me as He has done heretofore.’”¹¹ To “make a reality out of the theoretical assertion of the Pragmatic Sanction” required “a thorough modernization of the Monarchy.”¹² But before embarking on the ambitious project of reviving her sclerotic realm, Maria Theresa had to secure her domains. She concluded that, above all, she had to protect her patrimony and buttress her claims to the throne. Yet Maria Theresa knew she could not leave the fate of this sacred inheritance entirely to God. Forceful action was necessary to ensure that the Pragmatic Sanction was inviolable.

This was a task easier said than done. The Habsburg territories were far from secure; in fact, the disintegration of the dominions was a distinct possibility. Certain European countries greeted Maria Theresa’s accession with predatory anticipation. The monarchy’s instability, insolvency, and poor defensive capability presented opportunities for gaining Habsburg spoils. The queen’s own subjects, particularly in Lower Austria, viewed the accession of a woman to the throne with trepidation or disappointment. The German princes disliked the idea of a woman as head of the Habsburg dynasty. Maria Theresa’s Bohemian subjects, upset with the higher taxes imposed upon them by Charles VI, resented their reduced influence at court. They were among those whose allegiance to the queen was shaky. In the capital, loyalty to the new monarch was not widespread. Hardly anyone believed that the young and inexperienced Maria Theresa could rule on her own. The Habsburgs were regarded as a spent force. Many thought the queen could command strength only with her husband as coruler, but deep reservations about Francis persisted. As a native Lorrainer, Maria Theresa’s husband was seen as being under the influence of France, and France was still Austria’s number one enemy.

All these problems did not negatively affect Maria Theresa and Francis’s marriage. Unlike most royals, the couple shared the same bedroom and the same bed. By this time, however, whatever illusions Maria Theresa might have had about Francis had been broken. A devoted wife, the queen never begrudged her husband his faults, but her love for him did not prevent her from realizing that she could not lean too heavily on him. Francis did, however, possess one outstanding quality, and that was his absolute loyalty to Maria Theresa as sovereign and to the Habsburg dynasty as a whole. Maria Theresa also recognized Francis’s abilities in sorting out finances and soon involved him in the domain’s financial situation, which was nothing short of precarious. The queen saw to it that Francis was given responsibilities whenever possible in helping to run her realm, but never to an extent that infringed on her rights as a sovereign. She also reserved great ambitions for him, since Maria Theresa’s ultimate goal was to have her husband elected Holy Roman emperor. She was convinced that having her consort occupy that illustrious position would go a long way toward keeping the Habsburg domains intact. At this point, Maria Theresa could only hope that one day her husband would be crowned Holy Roman emperor.^g To help his chances, she appointed Francis as coregent of the Austrian and Bohemian lands.

Maria Theresa had hoped for some breathing space from Europe’s powers upon her accession, but she soon discovered that this was not to be. None but Russia and the Netherlands offered definitive support, while Britain made only vague noises about being friendly toward Austria. Strong hints from other European powers indicated that her father’s much vaunted Pragmatic Sanction stood on flimsy ground. King Louis XV’s octogenarian chief minister, Cardinal Fleury, for one, ignored making a firm commitment to recognize the Pragmatic Sanction upon Maria Theresa’s accession. The ambitious prince-elector Charles Albert of Bavaria had coveted the Habsburg crown and never recognized the Pragmatic Sanction. Certain segments of Maria Theresa’s subjects found the Bavarian a far more palatable ruler of the Habsburg domains. Little wonder then that Bavaria was among the countries that eagerly sought to dismember her Habsburg territories. Others included Saxony, Spain, and Sardinia. But the most menacing of all was Prussia.

Maria Theresa “all her life was as resolute in defending her own rights as she was scrupulous in respecting those of others.”¹³ But, unlike her father, who had great faith in treaties, Maria Theresa soon came to think otherwise. She lived in an era—as she was soon to find to her great cost—when treaties meant little, if anything. Leading the charge in this direction was King Frederick II of Prussia.

Five years older than Maria Theresa, Frederick grew up under a cruel and autocratic father. Frederick Wilhelm I, Frederick’s father, was known as the “soldier-king.” He ruled Prussia ably but was a complete failure as a father. Despotic by nature, Frederick Wilhelm sought to make his son and heir a soldier and brooked no opposition from him, despite the fact that the prince infinitely preferred music and art to the army. The father met Frederick’s minor infractions in his highly regimented life with humiliations and beatings. Years later Frederick recalled how “the severities of my father towards me, my sisters and my brothers … his ill-treatment, [were] often carried to the extreme.”¹⁴ At the age of eighteen, Frederick tried to escape his father’s cruelty by fleeing to England with his close friend, Hans Hermann von Katte. Upon their capture, the king imprisoned the pair. Frederick recalled of this time, “I was arrested, broken with blows, smacked in the face … . Without my good and excellent mother who came to my rescue, … [and] my sister … who was also very badly treated, I believe I should have died under the blows I received.”¹⁵ Frederick survived his incarceration, but his furious father forced his son to watch von Katte be executed for treason. At one point, it looked as if Prince Frederick might be executed as well, but the intervention of his mother as well as Maria Theresa’s father likely helped to spare the crown prince’s life.

There were signs that Frederick II might not be the military man his father had so ruthlessly tried to create. Frederick II preferred the company of artists and musicians and aspired to be a philosopher king. Equally at ease in French as he was in his native German, Frederick II championed French culture. He greatly admired the French philosopher Voltaire, who predicted that the king might turn Berlin into the Athens of Germany. With this reputation for culture and philosophy, Prussia’s king seemed like a natural ally for Austria. Additionally, since Maria Theresa’s father had pleaded with King Frederick Wilhelm I to spare his son’s life, Frederick II might have been sympathetic to her. But this was not the case. When the time came to make his move against Maria Theresa, Frederick II of Prussia pretended to be trustworthy. But he was no less eager for the spoils, having, like so much of Europe, carefully planned for this moment.

The new queen carefully assessed the situation. Bavaria was the immediate threat. She mobilized defensive troops for a possible attack and dispatched soldiers to Bohemia, Moravia, Tyrol, and Silesia. Silesia, with its mineral wealth, was of particular importance to the Habsburgs but also of great interest to the Prussians. Possession of Silesia would increase Prussia’s geographic borders and resources, enhancing a new German power. Frederick II was poised to order his troops to occupy Silesia (most of which was in present-day southwestern Poland). In December, just weeks after Maria Theresa’s accession, Frederick II of Prussia outlined his proposal to the queen. He was willing to support Francis becoming Holy Roman emperor and help the Habsburgs fight their opponents, even throwing money into Austria’s near-empty coffers, if she ceded most of Silesia. If she rejected these terms, he would side with her enemies, but above all, Frederick would interpret her rejection as war with Prussia. These were shocking demands, particularly considering Maria Theresa’s father’s earlier defense of Frederick against his father.

Francis learned of the audacious Prussian demands from Count Gotter, King Frederick’s Lord Marshal. Indignant, Francis insisted that Maria Theresa not give up any territory that was her rightful inheritance. “For my part,” added her ever-loyal husband, “not for the Imperial crown, not even for the whole world, will I sacrifice one right or one inch of the Queen’s lawful possessions.”¹⁶ The conversation descended into a loud quarrel, and the queen, who was listening by the door, signaled Francis to end the discussion.

Maria Theresa refused to see Gotter but relayed a powerful message to him and to Frederick that astounded many. She ordered the Lord Marshal to “return to his master and to tell him that as long as one Prussian soldier remained in Silesia, she would rather perish than negotiate with the King of Prussia.”¹⁷ Maria Theresa stood her ground. She would not cede any territory to the greedy Prussians. The King of Prussia did not hesitate to march into war. On December 16, 1740, Frederick II crossed into Silesia with his troops, making the richest and most industrialized of Maria Theresa’s provinces the first of her territories to be attacked. In January, Frederick told his foreign minister that he had crossed the Rubicon. The War of the Austrian Succession had begun.

Frederick bulldozed his way into nearby Silesia, claiming Prussia’s rights to certain principalities. Europe was startled to learn that the King of Prussia had brazenly attacked the Habsburg Empire with only the flimsiest pretext. Yet self-interest characterized the reaction of Europe’s powers to Frederick’s attack. Britain counseled Austria to come to terms with Prussia. Russia and Poland sent messages of regret. France certainly did not aid Austria but sent feelers out to Prussia. Left to her own devices, Maria Theresa had the choice of giving in to Prussia or fighting back. She fought back. At the Battle of Mollwitz, the Prussian cavalry performed badly, with Frederick II retreating, but his highly trained infantry saved the day. Ultimately, it was a matter of numbers, with 22,000 Prussians outfighting the 16,000 Austrians. The impact of the battle was not lost on Europe: “Little Prussia, a mere upstart, had crossed swords with one of the great established powers of Europe and come off the winner, Silesia was, at least for the time being, lost.”¹⁸

Amid these shocking developments, Maria Theresa, heavily pregnant, also had to contend with tragic events in her personal life. She had been inconsolable when Maria Elisabeth, her eldest daughter, died in 1740 within a few hours after falling ill. Then, seven months later, the terrible scenario repeated when her youngest daughter, one-year-old Maria Carolina, also sickened and died within several hours.^h These personal tragedies were difficult enough to deal with on their own, but they—especially Maria Carolina’s death—occurred at the same time as grave political problems preoccupied Maria Theresa. When she gathered around her councilors, including Francis, Maria Theresa was disappointed to find that all except Bartenstein urged her to compromise with Frederick II. Even her husband, who was normally so loyal to her and the Habsburg cause, had given the answer she did not wish to hear. These personal and political blows could have broken the spirit and will of many, but Maria Theresa refused to succumb to self-pity or fear.

Instead, the queen courageously faced her troubles and tried to find solutions. She also gave due credit to the source of her strength: her faith. During these dark moments, the queen fervently prayed to her patron St. Teresa of Ávila, and to St. Joseph. Maria Theresa recalled how much she prayed for St. Joseph’s intervention. The queen noted of him, “I cannot remember that I ever desired anything by his means which he hath failed to obtain for me.” She was grateful too for “the great favours which Almighty God hath done me by means of this blessed saint, and the dangers, both of soul and body, out of which he hath delivered me.”¹⁹

During the final weeks of her pregnancy, Maria Theresa continued to work tirelessly. She met with her ministers while propped up in bed. It was a pattern that she was to adhere to for her many pregnancies. With or without child, the head of the house of Habsburg would always be a diligent worker for her people.

Amid the strains of the war, on March 13, 1741, Maria Theresa gave birth to her fourth child, a son. At the baby’s baptism that same evening, many had anticipated that the dynasty’s male heir would be named after his grandfather Charles VI. Maria Theresa instead named her firstborn son, Joseph, in honor of the saint to whom she prayed to intercede with God for her petitions. After Joseph’s birth, the queen quickly returned to the business of ruling. Maria Theresa “had to learn quickly to command. A born worker, she was in her cabinet or at the council table from daybreak until late at night, conferring, planning, dictating, maneuvering, almost literally holding together with sheer strength of will the breaking package.”²⁰

The conflict against Prussia remained her uppermost priority, but her ministers continued to posture and bicker, doing little to serve their queen. Without a centralized army, Maria Theresa had to rely on her disparate territories to provide soldiers. Even once soldiers were assembled, however, the army was still at a disadvantage. Poorly paid, poorly trained, poorly equipped, they were no match for the highly trained Prussians. General Wilhelm Reinhard Neipperg, Francis’s onetime tutor, was sent to the front to command the Habsburg troops but again failed to rout the Prussians.

Within weeks of the Mollwitz defeat, Europe’s powers recalibrated their attitudes toward Maria Theresa based, again, upon self-interest. Not surprisingly, their policies were largely aligned with Prussia’s actions. France went against Austria formally, siding with Bavaria. Under the direction of Cardinal Fleury and Marshal Belle-Isle, France declared support for Charles Albert of Bavaria’s quest to become Holy Roman emperor and his claims on the Habsburg succession. This action prompted other countries, such as Spain, Poland, Saxony, and Bavaria, to go against Maria Theresa too. “It was practically Austria contra mundum, for Russia, although an ally since 1726, was too preoccupied with internal dissension, and with a threat from Sweden, to help.”²¹ Clearly, the Pragmatic Sanction was dissolved and the queen nearly isolated. Only Britain held out, yet its position was delicate because the British had agreements with both Austria and Prussia and did not wish to rock the boat either way.

Instead of giving up hope and conceding to Frederick II, Maria Theresa searched for aid and concluded that an appeal to her Hungarian subjects would help the Habsburg cause. She accordingly ordered that her coronation as Queen of Hungary take place. It was a risky move, as a number of Hungarians wanted greater autonomy from Vienna. Well aware that she needed the strong support of a prominent native Hungarian, Maria Theresa cleverly cultivated the friendship of Count John Palffy, whom she had known for years and always admired. At seventy-seven, Palffy had enjoyed a colorful life full of wine, women, and horse races. The count, who had fought with the famed Prince Eugene, understood that the Hungarians were better off under the rule of the Habsburgs than under the Ottoman Turks, who had enslaved many of his countrymen. Palffy thus sympathized with the Habsburg cause. Maria Theresa appealed to his chivalry in her hour of need, and he responded with devotion.

Palffy smoothed the way for Maria Theresa’s visit to Hungary and coronation. The queen could not afford to bungle before the assembled Hungarians. One slight misstep, one small unintended offending gesture, would set the crowds firmly against her. Of particular concern was an aspect of the coronation that could have gone spectacularly wrong: Maria Theresa, unlike Queen Isabella, was not a natural horsewoman. But the Hungarians placed great emphasis on horsemanship, and a monarch uneasy in the saddle would have been disastrous. Maria Theresa, who was to mount a black stallion at the foot of a hill, practiced her riding assiduously back in Austria. In Pressburg, Hungary, on June 25, 1741, the practice paid off. Maria Theresa did everything right. At the crucial moment, she cut a fine figure and galloped to the top of the hill. She then drew her sword and pointed it to four corners. It was a gesture that announced her intention to rule as queen. This symbolic act echoed Queen Isabella of Castile’s coronation, when the sword of state was likewise displayed.

Gestures to secure her crown, however, were not enough. Maria Theresa needed concrete help from the Hungarians to fight off King Frederick II. And so she returned in September that year and appeared before the Hungarian assembly. Addressing them in Latin, which the Hungarian nobles understood, a dignified queen outlined the dangers they faced and asked for help in defending their country, her crown, the Habsburg domains, and her children. Maria Theresa’s appeal was straightforward: “The disastrous situation of affairs has moved us to lay before our dear and faithful states of Hungary … the very existence of the kingdom of Hungary, of our own person, of our children, and our crown, are now at stake. Forsaken by all, we place our sole resource in the fidelity, arms, and long-tried valour of the Hungarians.”²² When it came to her children, Maria Theresa’s normally calm demeanor, which she had already learned to project, suddenly changed. Tears filled her eyes, her voice trembled with emotion.

In reply, some in the assembly protested, but in the end, amid enthusiastic shouting, the nobles agreed to help her. With sabers drawn, the assembled nobles shouted: “We will consecrate our lives and arms; we will die for our queen, Maria Theresa!”²³ Days later, during the swearing in ceremony of Francis as coregent, Maria Theresa made a dramatic gesture by bringing her son and heir, the baby archduke Joseph, before the assembly. The sight of their queen with her young and vulnerable son moved the nobles, who again shouted: “We will die for the queen and her family; we will die for Maria Theresa!”²⁴

Maria Theresa took great risks going to Hungary. She went against the advice of her ministers, buttressed only by Francis’s support. Her instincts, however, proved correct. Her pleas succeeded beyond her expectations. The twenty-four year-old queen felt confident as never before. She came to believe that she had abilities, including most certainly the power to sway people’s opinions. Maria Theresa won the people to her side by the sheer force of her personality. In the process, she got Hungary’s powerful nobles to side with her and, just as important, received the pledge of thousands of Hungarian soldiers to fight for her.

Maria Theresa needed all the troops she could muster. The French were on the march, and the Bavarians were making their way into Upper Austria. By mid-September, Bavarian troops occupied Linz, the province’s capital, a mere hundred miles from Vienna. This meant that Charles Albert’s soldiers were only days away from marching into Maria Theresa’s capital, then highly vulnerable because of its weak garrison and poor fortifications. Only French orders prevented Charles Albert from invading Vienna. Instead, he marched to Prague. The French had ordered this to keep the Bavarians from gaining too much power should Charles Albert topple Maria Theresa. At this point, Maria Theresa and Frederick II reached a truce, though the queen made it plain this was only a temporary measure.

Meanwhile, Francis again underperformed as Austrian commander. Prague, the capital of the queen’s Bohemian lands, fell to the French ( joined by Bavarian and Saxon troops) in 1741. Charles Albert was crowned King of Bohemia in December. When Prague fell, Maria Theresa gave an impassioned message to Prince Kinsky, who had been her Bohemian chancellor:

So Prague is lost … . Here then, Kinsky, we find ourselves at the sticking point where only courage can save the country and the Queen, for without the country I should indeed be a poor princess. My own resolve is taken; to stake everything, win or lose, on saving Bohemia; and it is with this in view that you should work and lay your plans. It may involve destruction and desolation which twenty years will be insufficient to restore; but I must hold the country and the soil, and for this all my armies, all the Hungarians, shall die before I surrender an inch of it. This, then, is the crisis: do not spare the country, only hold it. Do all you can to help your people and to keep the troops contented, lacking nothing: you know, better than I, the consequences of failure in this … . You will say that I am cruel; that is true. But I know that all the cruelties I commit today to hold the country I shall one day be in a position to make good a hundred-fold. And this I shall do. But for the present I close my ear to pity.²⁵

Maria Theresa’s defense of her realms gained little traction. Worse, Frederick II seized Olmütz, a key fortress on the way to Vienna. The queen reacted to this disconcerting news with steadfastness. She ordered Field Marshal Khevenhüller to proceed with plans to retrieve Upper Austria, even if this meant going in the opposite direction of Vienna at such a vulnerable moment. Less levelheaded individuals would have counseled the queen to save the capital instead. In the end, Maria Theresa proved correct in her assessment. By following her instincts, “she showed herself for the first time a great commander as well as a courageous one by refusing to panic.”²⁶ Khevenhüller, commanding thirty thousand soldiers, marched into Munich, Bavaria’s capital, and captured Upper Austria for his queen. This meant that at Charles Albert’s moment of glory, when he was crowned Holy Roman emperor in February 1742, he had simultaneously lost his capital to Maria Theresa. The queen was grateful to Khevenhüller for his victory. She sent him a portrait of herself with Archduke Joseph and a message that read: “Dear and faithful Khevenhüller, here you behold the Queen, who knows what it is to be forsaken by the whole world … . May your achievements be as renowned as those of your master, the great Eugene, who rests in God. Be fully assured that, now and always, you and your family will never lack the grace and favour and thanks of myself, and my descendants.”²⁷

But even with this victory, Maria Theresa could not rest. Her enemy, Frederick II of Prussia, broke his compromise agreement with her “quite cold-bloodedly after only a few weeks”²⁸ and ordered his forces to march into Bohemia. With her troops exhausted, Maria Theresa was compelled to come to an agreement with Frederick, and so the Peace of Breslau-Berlin was signed in July 1742. Maria Theresa paid a bitter price, giving up most of Silesia. The loss of Silesia, “whose million plus inhabitants had been the most productive and heavily taxed of all the Habsburg lands,” also meant that “German speakers now comprised no more than a third of the monarchy’s 16 million people, a demographic shift pregnant with consequences for the next century.”²⁹

The loss of Silesia left Maria Theresa completely disgusted by Frederick II’s perfidy. She never forgave or forgot his brazen disregard for agreements and what was called the “rape” of Silesia. Decades later she described her archenemy to her son Joseph as nothing short of a “Monster.”³⁰